Africa

Drums were beating, horns blowing, and people were seen all running in one direction; - the cause was a funeral dance, and I joined the crowd, and soon found myself in the midst of the entertainment. The dancers were most grotesquely got up.

The country in the immediate neighbourhood of Latooka was parched, as there had been no rain for some time. The latitude was 4 degrees 35', longitude 32 degrees 55' E.; the rains had commenced in February on the mountains on the south side of the valley, about eighteen miles distant. Every day there was an appearance of a storm; the dark clouds gathered ominously around the peak of the Gebel Lafeet above the town, but they were invariably attracted by the higher range on the opposite and south side of the valley, where they daily expended themselves at about 3 P.M.

Ibrahim returned from Gondokoro, bringing with him a large supply of ammunition. A wounded man of Chenooda's people also arrived, the sole relic of the fight with the Latookas; he had been left for dead, but had recovered, and for days and nights he had wandered about the country, in thirst and hunger, hiding like a wild beast from the sight of human beings, his guilty conscience marking every Latooka as an enemy.

On the 30th May, about an hour before daybreak, I was awoke by a rattle of musketry, which continued some time in irregular volleys, and subsided into a well-sustained and steady fire in single shots. On leaving my hut, I found the camp of Koorshid's people almost empty, while my own men were climbing on the roofs of their huts to obtain a view towards the west. Nothing was in sight, although the firing still continued at a distance of about a mile, apparently on the other side of a belt of trees.

For months we dragged on a miserable existence at Obbo, wrecked by fever; the quinine exhausted; thus the disease worried me almost to death, returning at intervals of a few days. Fortunately my wife did not suffer so much as I did. I had nevertheless prepared for the journey south; and as travelling on foot would have been impossible in our weak state, I had purchased and trained three oxen in lieu of horses.

by Samuel White Baker

Condensed by E.J.W From "The Nile Tributaries of Abyssinia"
and "The Albert N'yanza Great Basin of the Nile."

by Henry M. Stanley

"If there is love between us, inconceivably delicious, and profitable will our intercourse be; if not, your time is lost, and you will only annoy me. I shall seem to you stupid, and the reputation I have false. All my good is magnetic, and I educate not by lessons, but by going about my business." - Emerson's 'Representative Men'.

by Richard Harding Davis

1907

TO CECIL CLARK DAVIS, MY FELLOW VOYAGER ALONG THE COASTS OF AFRICA

by Richard F. Burton